Post COIL Faculty Reflections

A post-COIL faculty reflection is a s a thoughtful and critical look back at the teaching and learning experience after completing a Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) course. It allows faculty to reflect on what worked well, the challenges faced, student engagement, and their collaboration with international partners. It also helps them assess the impact on their teaching practices and plan improvements for future COIL experiences. These reflections support professional growth and help institutions enhance global learning initiatives.

  • Building Sustainable Academic Partnerships Across Borders: A Faculty Reflection

    The Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) course, which I co-taught with Dr. Esther-Maria Guggenmos of Lund University in Sweden, was a rewarding and eye-opening experience that demonstrated the power of international collaboration. The course included my Buddhism and Social Justice (RLGS 3893) at the University of Denver and Dr. Guggenmos' Engaged Buddhism (RHID86) at Lund. We investigated how Buddhists, notably in Asia, have engaged in social justice, politics, and environmental action during the last century and a half. We met for five weeks via Zoom, beginning in the early mornings in Denver and ending in the afternoons in Lund, teaching in real time and integrating our areas of expertise into a collaborative learning experience.

    My connection with Dr. Guggenmos began in 2003 during a DU delegation trip to Lund University. We immediately saw a unique opportunity to work together, fusing my interest in social justice movements with her research on contemporary religion in China.  We carefully designed the course syllabus over the next year, balancing cultural perspectives, academic rigor, and the logistical challenges of working across an eight-hour time difference. As the course unfolded, the beauty of COIL became clear. Despite being separated by thousands of miles, our students, from two institutions and two continents, were deeply engaged in rich discussions. Small group breakout sessions allowed them to exchange ideas and explore how Buddhist thought intersects with global issues like race, caste, gender, and the environment.

    What stood out were the divergent perspectives our students brought to the table around the intersection of religion and politics that forced us all to re-examine our assumptions about these complex issues. Our students’ different cultural contexts illuminated the ways that religion and politics shape social movements in distinct ways, pushing all of us to think critically about our own perspectives. It was both humbling and inspiring to witness the students' intellectual growth as they grappled with these questions together. For me, the value of COIL is clear. It offers international experience without the need for travel, making global learning accessible and impactful. The course allowed me to engage with a peer from another country, leverage her expertise, and create a learning experience that was dynamic, intellectually rigorous, and deeply collaborative. But perhaps more importantly, it also helped students build connections across culture, demonstrating that despite time zones and geographical distances, we share more in common than we realize.

    I encourage my fellow faculty to consider participating in COIL courses as It’s an extraordinary opportunity to broaden your teaching horizons, create a more globally aware classroom, and cultivate a deeper sense of connection with peers and students around the world. By offering a COIL course, you open the door to an enriching and truly collaborative international experience, right from the comfort of your own campus. The world is more connected than ever before, and COIL allows us to embrace this reality and harness it for transformative learning. I can’t wait to offer this course again, refine it based on what we’ve learned, and continue building cross-cultural connections with faculty and students from around the globe.

    Benjamin Nourse
    Assistant Professor, Buddhist Studies, University of Denver.

  • Teaching Immigration Politics Through COIL: A U.S. and Sweden Case Study

    Teaching and researching immigration politics leaves you at the mercy of the moment. The increasingly hostile rhetoric towards immigrant communities looms over us as we teach students the theoretical and empirical research about immigration politics. This divisive issue is not unique to the United States. Politicians and political parties across many countries have emerged on the single issue of closing borders and excluding immigrants from society. Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) provides an opportunity for students to explore and understand immigration politics beyond the United States. In the Winter Quarter of 2025, my Advanced Seminar on Migration Politics included a module where we collaborated with our partners in Lund University’s (LU) Political Science Department. DU students met and collaborated with LU students in Dr. Jonathan Polk’s course in Comparative Politics.

    The political science departments at DU and LU have a strong partnership through the Global Masters program. To further enhance the partnership, we have had discussions about potential COIL courses. Conversations began with Professor Polk’s visit to Denver in February 2024 and my visit to Lund that same year. Our conversation about a COIL on immigration politics arose due to the geographies of our institutions. Lund is a short train ride to Malmö, which is home to one of Sweden’s largest immigrant populations and has often been the focal point of immigration politics in Sweden. Similarly, Denver is adjacent to Aurora, which is also home to immigrants of various backgrounds.

    Our goal was to develop a COIL project where students examine the similarities and differences between the United States and Sweden at the national level, as well as the local level through Denver and Malmö. What we did not expect was Aurora, Colorado to be the center of the immigration issue during the 2024 US presidential campaigns due to the misinformation and lies about the immigrant communities there. Teaching this COIL required students to address the current moment. The meetings between DU and LU students began as deportation raids occurred in nearby communities in the Denver area. Students had to confront a much larger question: how and why have the U.S. and Sweden reached this point?

    Professor Polk and I organized seven groups of DU and LU students to meet and discuss the course material that addressed the following topics: (1) why do people migrate, (2) public opinion on immigration, and (3) where political parties stand. They had to analyze these topics at the national level (US/Sweden) and at the local level (Denver/Malmö). The COIL concluded with a video project where students presented their comparative analysis in a 20-minute collaborative video. The quality of their analysis was brilliant. Students embraced the challenge to address one of the most important (and complex) questions in political science and today’s political environment. COIL allowed students to understand the world around them and the communities they live in at the same time.

    Through COIL, the students taught me how important it is to confront current events as they happen and use our expertise as scholars to explain what is going on and generate new questions. This experience taught me new ways of teaching that I plan to develop in all my courses. What I did not expect from COIL was that the student collaborations would inspire me to take on new research endeavors. Evaluating assignments became a productive intellectual experience that led me to develop new research ideas. I am now developing research proposals to examine immigration politics between different cities in different countries. I no longer feel at the mercy of the moment when teaching. Rather, I learned from students to leverage the moment so we can learn, question, and understand together as a community. 

    Jesse Acevedo

    Assistant Professor

    Political Science